As a new year approaches, the evolution of the workplace shows no signs of slowing down. Each shift brings fresh challenges and questions about how best to keep employees engaged, connected, and supported in an increasingly dynamic world.

At Donut, we’re focused on transforming these questions into actionable insights, with people programs designed to empower and inspire teams. Looking ahead, we expect these five trends to remain major topics of discussion.

1. Automation + Strategy

Tools that automate repetitive HR tasks (like Donut!) have freed HR leaders up to be more strategic than ever — and the availability and quality of HR automations is only accelerating.

In a recent webinar, Donut sat down with the team at Huntress to learn more about the strategy behind their high-scoring employee feedback. In the course of our conversation, Veronica Werve, People Coordinator at Huntress, estimated that automating content to new hires via Donut now saves her around 96 hours (12 days) a year, sharing that setting up those automations freed time for her to be a more strategic partner alongside her colleagues.

A recent study by Workato revealed a remarkable 599% rise in HR automation, signaling a widespread shift towards more efficient, streamlined processes. With a growing array of automation tools available, the focus now turns to using them tactically. What tasks benefit most from automation, and where is a human touch irreplaceable?

Quick wins, like automating highly repetitive tasks, can save time and reduce errors, while freeing employees to engage in more strategic, high-impact work. Yet, as SHRM points out, balancing automation with genuine human connection remains critical. While tools can streamline operations, the value of personal interactions—such as team check-ins and building trust through shared moments—shouldn’t be overlooked. Preserving these connections ensures that even in an automated world, workplaces remain human-centered and engaging.

2. Maintaining Mental Health & Avoiding Burnout

The world increasingly demands more from us: more output, more quickly, often with fewer resources. As the pressures of climate shifts, of ever-rising expenses, and limited resources test our resilience, it’s no surprise that burnout is on the rise.

Illustrating this, mentions of “burnout” in Glassdoor reviews reached an all-time high during Q2 of 2024, an increase of 44% from the February 2020.

Burnout is known to impact executive function, including workplace productivity, and can pass on hidden costs to organizations. Employers can mitigate some of the impacts of burnout by creating systemic changes at the policy level that not only address the ongoing burnout crisis but help proactively prevent burnout by correcting the underlying circumstances that can trigger it.

These can include, but are not limited to:

• Training managers around the “warning signs” of burnout and providing guidance for discussions about capacity and well-being in their 1:1s with direct reports
• Explicit policies around minimum PTO as mentioned above
• Mental health stipends as a way to improve accessibility to mental health care (as many insurance plans are lacking in this area)
• Regular pulse-checks with employees to gain insight into engagement and well-being—something that creates the opportunity to respond to earlier signs
• Prioritizing building a culture of psychological safety and supporting it with relevant policies, such as ways to provide anonymous feedback and a building a realistic approach toward mistakes into company values
• Creating supportive policies and avoiding performance punishments

3. “Return to Office” and Impacts on People Programming

Over the past several years, a number of companies that had changed policies around remote work in response to COVID have begun to make yet another adjustment. For many, this has resulted in a variety of RTO (“Return to Office”) mandates for employees.

A trending topic ever since, we have seen continued coverage this year by just about every major outlet imaginable, such as the Washington Post (who also recently issued an RTO mandate to their own employees), Harvard Business Review, Forbes, CBS News, NBC News, WIRED, and so many more!

For us here at Donut, a notable aspect of these conversations involves RTO’s impact on people programming. To give some examples:

• Needed changes to programming that may have been previously hosted 100% remotely such as virtual coffee chats
• Necessary updates to policies which now may be out of date or not always applicable
• A risk of silos forming between employees in different locations
• A reduction in information accessibility—such as decisions that might have otherwise happened in a Slack thread now happening over lunch, with some stakeholders missing relevant updates
• An uptick in cost of living for employees due to changes in needed commuting, childcare, food expenses, etc

As we discuss these changes, two key themes emerge:

1. Smoothing Transitions: How can we ease adjustments and foster engagement during a shift back to the office? For example, if commuting adds a financial burden, a commuter benefit might encourage adoption of an RTO mandate. Identifying supportive policy changes can help reduce friction and boost buy-in.
2. Adaptability: People programs must be flexible to meet evolving needs. For instance, Donut’s Intros can seamlessly shift between in-person and virtual meetups. Addressing communication silos with structured, consistent practices ensures clear and accessible interactions across all formats.

Ultimately, proactive planning and continual feedback loops are essential for People teams to adapt and thrive in changing circumstances

4. Strategic Budgeting: Driving Impact Where It Matters Most

It’s highly advisable to be strategic when planning budgets for People-related expenses. Time and resources are finite, and the question of ‘how to maximize impact’ remains an ongoing challenge for teams of any size.

Priority based budgeting is an important strategy for a number of organizations, but a lack of needed insight into the comprehensive costs of people programs can sometimes result in missed opportunities.

With many companies having slowed or paused hiring in response to economic uncertainty and market pressures other internal initiatives related to workforce development and employee engagement can also be affected.

As we explored in our Total Cost of Ownership paper, a strategic approach to budget allocation requires understanding the long-term impacts of factors such as attrition rates, hours spent in onboarding or training, team salaries, and more.

The costs involved in employee development and retention go deeper than our yearly spending on software or events. A holistic understanding of direct, indirect, and hidden costs grants us insight into what areas of investment are most impactful and best prioritized.

As we plan for the year ahead, we’ll be better-equipped to align our budgets to those high-impact initiatives that drive engagement and productivity.

5. The Critical Role of Employee Engagement

As one of the most meaningful and also complex elements of a healthy organization, employee engagement is a hot topic. A meta-analysis conducted by Gallup this year found a 23% higher rate of profitability among teams scoring in the top quartile on employee engagement.

With its ability to shape almost any aspect of a business—from productivity to customer satisfaction — we don’t expect discussion around this to slow any time soon.

In 2025, we anticipate conversations around engagement will intersect with other items on this list. How do things like budget-related reductions in available people programming, or a team’s return to required in-office days, impact engagement scores?

This also underlines how critical it is to solicit feedback from teammates often. Every team is different! From robust sources like quarterly engagement surveys, to quick pulse checks via Slack, regularly gathering data directly from your team will give you the clearest insight into what is shaping employee engagement within your org.

Final Takeaways for the Year Ahead:

Across these themes, we see continued evidence of the importance of feedback and iteration. We’ve written this looking ahead to 2025, but in doing so, the value of a forward-thinking view—of taking actions that anticipate and prepare instead of acting responsively—stands out to us as an important strategic position when it comes to policy and planning.

We’d love to hear from you about what you think the year ahead will bring! You can reach out to us at [email protected]